just in case
by ShadowsTakeAll
Summary: "Stop talking about it like a suicide attempt. I wasn't trying to kill myself. I told you, Lori Stevens kidnapped me."


**This show needs more fanfic. So here is another one. Set after season one, ignoring season two. Since this is my first time writing for the show it's a little rough, but if there's enough interest I may well write more for this fandom. So, please enjoy my first ever Finding Carter fic, and leave a review so I know what you think.**

X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X

 _"My name? You know my name." Chin raised, defiant, but eyes guarded, confused._

 _"I just want to make sure." Even gaze, professional smile._

 _A sigh. "Fine. My name is Carter S-" Breaks off, tenses. Eyes lower. "Wilson. My name is Carter Wilson."_

 _The professional smile softens. "Thank you, Carter. Can you tell me what you're doing here?"_

 _A snort; not malicious but definitely dismissive. "You're the shrink. You tell me."_

 _Silence. The almost-friendly smile gets a firm edge, tilts down slightly. "Okay. I'll tell you what I know." Shuffling paper, quiet breathing. "You were admitted here this morning, unconscious and unresponsive. The doctors ran some tests, and they found something in your system. I'll spare you the details, but essentially it's a depressant, a drug normally used recreationally. Do you know how that got into your system?"_

 _Another snort, this one almost derisive – but not directed at the doctor. "Yeah. My 'mother'-" air quotes sketched around the word "- dosed me with it when I wouldn't cooperate."_

 _Sharp intake of breath. Scribbling. More silence – hesitation, not disappointment. "You say she wanted you to cooperate. What was she asking you to do?"_

 _"She wanted me to…" A pause, eyes lowering again. "She wanted me to run away with her. To pick up where we left off."_

 _"This woman you call your mother… she's not really your parent, is she?" Smile back up, more sympathetic now._

 _"No. She's my kidnapper." Eyes raised again, fist clenched. "She took me when I was three, and then again when…" Hesitation; uncertain. Regrouping. "The doctors said it was a week ago, so I guess…"_

 _"And she wanted you to stay with her, correct?"_

 _"Yes, she did. She still thinks I'm her daughter."_

 _"But you don't see it that way, do you?"_

 _"No. My home is with the Wilsons."_

 _Silence again, eyes meeting, both thinking._

 _"So you were reluctant to go with her. What did it feel like, when she took you this time?"_

 _"It felt like I was being torn away from my family. Like she was taking everything from me."_

 _A pause, thoughtful. "Carter, when a young person such as yourself – especially one who's been through as much trauma as you have – feels like they have nothing left to lose, it's not uncommon to entertain certain… ideas. Do you understand?"_

 _A quick shake of the head, eyes darkening again. Reserved. Wary. "No. I don't understand."_

 _"What I'm saying, Carter, is that you're not the first person to perform such an extreme act. Now whether it was a cry for help or a genuine attempt -"_

 _"Stop."_

 _"I'm sorry?"_

 _"Stop talking about it like a suicide attempt. I wasn't trying to kill myself. I told you, Lori Stevens kidnapped me and drugged me, and it must have reacted badly with my body or something because -" Panicking. Anger battles fear._

 _"Carter. It's okay. Just breathe."_

 _A few minutes pass. Then._

 _"Okay. Why don't you tell me what happened?"_

X.X.X.X.X

It was seven thirty two when Carter woke up. The only reason she knew that was because she opened her eyes to the blurry numbers on a digital clock sitting precariously on the edge of the nightstand; there was no other way to gauge how long she'd been out. She felt groggy, like she'd been asleep for a long time, but the curtains were drawn and the room was lit by artificial light, giving no indication of the conditions outside. It could be night, morning, middle of the day – there was no way to know. Carter only had a few seconds to contemplate whether it was seven in the morning or at night before a more pressing concern pushed all other thoughts from her mind.

She shot upright, her heart suddenly pounding. Her mind was working slowly, like her neurons were firing through thick mud, but her body was on high alert already. The last thing she remembered was Lori leading her from the café, holding her up. A shudder ran through her at the thought: for a few moments there, Lori had been the only thing she had to lean on.

Then her memory was a blank. The mud in her mind began to clear as she closed her eyes, trying to remember what had happened. Lori had said something about being parked nearby. Had she put Carter in the car and taken her somewhere? Where were they? How far away from her family was she?

Her thoughts were interrupted by a gentle click, the sound of a door being unlocked. Her eyes snapped open just in time to see Lori enter the room. She'd dyed her hair – again – and was wearing dark sunglasses, but it was definitely her. As she closed the door behind her, Lori took off her glasses and met Carter's look of growing fear with one of relief.

"Oh, baby," she said, setting down a paper grocery bag near the door and hurrying over to her, "you're up. I was starting to get worried."

In stunned silence Carter watched Lori approach, but when the woman reached the bed she was currently sitting on, Carter stiffened. The action wasn't lost on Lori.

"What's wrong, baby? Are you okay?"

Carter let out a disbelieving laugh. "Am I -" she echoed quietly, and then shook her head, utterly unable to believe that the woman in front of her was genuinely asking whether she was okay… after having drugged and subsequently kidnapped her. No, she wasn't okay.

"I know you're probably confused -" Lori went on, reaching for a bottle of water on the nightstand – an action that caused Carter to flinch, backing up against the wall and bringing her knees toward her. She didn't want Lori to touch her, to hold her, to even look at her.

"I'm not confused." Carter tried to make her voice sharp, but she could tell that it was shaking with fear. A year ago she would have laughed at anyone who'd told her she could ever be so afraid of her mom, but it was all too real now. Up until today – if it had even been today; Carter had no idea how long she'd been out – some part of Carter had still trusted Lori. Somehow her actions of thirteen years ago were forgivable. But what she'd done at the café had shattered what little faith Carter still had in her 'mother'.

Lori quirked an eyebrow up, still holding onto the bottle of water – though making no move to hand it to Carter, having sensed the girl's reluctance. "You still don't look well, baby. Maybe you should get some sleep."

" _Sleep_ ," Carter echoed, and this time the sharpness did outweigh the shaking. "I don't need sleep, Lori. I've had enough of that." She paused, waiting for Lori to offer some kind of explanation – an apology, even – but none came. "You drugged me," she said at last, irritated to note how small she sounded, how much like a child. She needed to be strong here, but being around Lori reminded her of her childhood, of everything she'd lost when the truth came out.

"I know." Lori's expression softened, something like remorse shining in her eyes. "But I promise it wouldn't hurt you. I just needed to get you away from… from _those people_."

The vehemence in her voice startled Carter. She'd known Lori didn't like the Wilsons, but she hadn't been aware of the animosity between them. She stared at the woman she'd called a mother, trying to judge just how far she would take this. Until now Carter had thought Lori incapable of hurting her, but now she wasn't so sure.

And that thought scared her more than she would ever admit.

X.X.X.X.X

 _"Do you know where you were, at that point?" An encouraging smile, falling just short._

 _"I don't know. Somewhere on Route 50 I think?" A shrug. "She never told me where we were."_

 _"Did this woman – Lori – tell you where you were going?"_

 _A soft laugh. "As far away as she could get. She didn't want my real parents to ever find me."_

 _"When you say your real parents, you mean…?"_

 _A raised eyebrow; disdain. "Elizabeth and David Wilson." No hesitance; no doubt. Just the truth. A pause, then, with the hint of a challenge: "Of course."_

 _"Good. I was just checking. So, how long were you at that first motel?"_

 _"Not long. An hour, maybe."_

 _"What did you do while you were there?"_

 _"Lori made me eat something and change my clothes, and then she practically threw me into her car."_

 _"Where did she take you?"_

 _"To some other dingy motel. She wouldn't tell me where."_

 _"Okay. Tell me about this other hotel. What happened there?"_

X.X.X.X.X

"Let go of me." To emphasize her point, Carter yanked her arm away from Lori, who seemed disappointed but not surprised. Lori let go, reluctantly, and then nudged Carter through the door, closing and locking it behind them.

Once she was in the room Carter turned to face Lori, crossing her arms and glaring at her. _There's plenty of bad blood here,_ Carter thought with a twinge of sadness. "So this is your plan?" she asked. "Just keep jumping from one crappy motel to another and hope nobody catches us?"

"Of course not," Lori said quickly, sounding almost insulted. "This will just be for a couple of days, until we hit the border."

"The border?" The words fell from Carter's mouth before she had time to lace them with the anger that was currently surging through her. "We're leaving the state?"

"We can't stay here," Lori said; straightforward, matter-of-fact. As if there was nothing wrong with this situation at all. Like it was _normal_ , as if that had any meaning at all anymore.

Not bothering to answer, Carter went over to one of the beds – reassured by the plural, since it meant they were probably at least spending the night here – and sat down. The past twenty four hours were catching up to her, like a physical weight pressing down on her and pinning her to the spot. Despite what she'd told Lori earlier, she did need sleep – she just didn't want to do it with her kidnapper hovering over her like some possessive hawk. Lori still thought of herself as Carter's mother, and she was starting to realize how dangerous Lori could be when she was being protective.

"It's been a long day," Lori said, her voice soft and compassionate, the way Carter remembered her being when she was a kid and home sick from school. Except nothing was as she remembered it, because it had all been based on a sick, twisted lie. "Why don't you get some sleep, baby?"

Instinctively, Carter stood up; an unspoken sign of rebellion. She wasn't going to go along with Lori's plan, and she wanted to make that perfectly clear. By the way Lori's mouth twitched downwards, she knew she'd made her point. "I'm not going with you," Carter announced. "And I'm not going to sleep with you in the room."

"I'm just trying to make this easier for you," Lori said, her voice equal parts hurt and confused. It baffled Carter, the way Lori though that _she_ was the one who was being unreasonable. In Lori's mind, Carter was her daughter, and she should follow her anywhere. And the scariest thing was that not that long ago Carter would have done exactly that.

X.X.X.X.X

 _"I did sleep, eventually. When I woke up we were already in the car."_

 _"What happened then?"_

 _"We kept changing hotels every day, but we were only at each for a few hours. Lori just wanted to keep moving."_

 _"How long were you with her?"_

 _"A week, I guess. I don't know. It was hard to keep track."_

 _"Why is that?"_

 _"I had to keep my guard up. I didn't want her getting the upper hand."_

 _"Of course. And it paid off, didn't it? You got away eventually?"_

 _"Not exactly."_

 _"But she's not here now, is she?"_

 _"Obviously not. But I didn't escape."_

 _"Then how did you get to the hospital?"_

 _"Lori brought me here."_

X.X.X.X.X

They'd been running for a week. Seven days of minimal sleep, constant tension, and strangely one-sided animosity. Lori was treating the whole thing like a road trip, chatting away about what it would be like when they got 'there' – she never said where _there_ was – and pointedly ignoring Carter's sharp silence.

It had been seven days, and Carter had finally had enough.

As they pulled up outside yet another low-budget motel, Lori motioned for Carter to get out. She didn't. Lori frowned, holding the car door open. Carter stayed where she was, refusing to look at the woman she had once considered her mother.

"Come on, Ca- _honey_ ," she said, almost breaking their cardinal rule: no names. Carter Stevens was an alias, but it was also the name on the amber alert. They couldn't risk it.

"No," Carter said, still staring resolutely in front of her. Her entire body was tense, running low on everything she needed – sleep, food, even water. She'd refused to eat or drink anything that she didn't open herself, given what had happened at the café the day Lori took her. She didn't trust her, and she didn't want to let her get control.

"We have to get inside," Lori insisted, but Carter still refused.

And what had started out as defiance quickly fell into helplessness.

In a move so quick Carter didn't have time to react, Lori's hand flew out, covering Carter's mouth. _Scream,_ was her first instinct, and then _swallow_ as she felt a small tablet pushed into her mouth. Her body reacted, automatically seeking to swallow it, craving food. But her mind protested, knowing that whatever Lori gave her couldn't be good. But Lori was relentless, and Carter had no choice. The tablet slid down her throat, cold and unpleasant, and it only took a minute to work.

And then she was gone.

X.X.X.X.X

 _Silence._

 _"So your mother – I'm sorry, your kidnapper – gave you the drug?"_

 _"Yes." Firm, slightly challenging. "Like I told you at the start of this meeting."_

 _"And that was, when, this morning?"_

 _"I guess. We drove through the night, so we ended up at the motel in the morning."_

 _"But the drug she gave you had an adverse reaction."_

 _Narrowed eyes, and then a snort. "Well, yeah. It put me in a coma. I'd say that's about as adverse as you can get."_

 _"But this isn't the first time you've been in this kind of situation, is it?"_

 _A confused pause, and then a roll of the eyes. "No. I've been in a coma before." Another pause, and then, quickly: "But it was just a small one."_

 _"I see." More scribbling, a faint sigh. "So you maintain that you didn't try to kill yourself? Perhaps as a way to escape your… 'mother'?" Quote marks sketched in the air, voice heavy with irony._

 _"Yes." A moment to sink in, then, softer: "When can I see my family? Are they here yet?"_

 _"The Wilsons, you mean?"_

 _A very pointed silence._

 _Throat cleared, eyes averted._

 _"Right. Of course you mean the Wilsons."_

 _"Are they here yet?"_

 _"No. Since you came in with fake ID, we had a hard time finding your real identity. And we couldn't notify the Wilsons until we did that -"_

 _"So when will they be here?"_

 _A glance at the clock, a quick calculation. "An hour, maybe."_

 _"Right."_

 _"Since your story seems to be true -"_

 _"It's not a story." Jaw clenched, eyes bright. "It's the truth."_

 _"Yes. Well, if that's the case, I see no reason to keep you here on psychiatric grounds. As soon as the doctors sign off on you and your family arrives, you'll be ready to go."_

 _A pause, the news sinking in. "So… can I go back to my room now?"_

 _"If there's nothing else you want to talk about."_

 _"There isn't."_

 _"Just in case you do need someone to talk to, I'm going to give you my card."_

 _"Thanks, but I'm not going to need it."_

 _"Well, if you ever do, you know how to get in touch."_

X.X.X.X.X

Fifty minutes later, Carter is lying in her hospital bed, still dressed in the plain white hospital gown and desperately wishing her family would show up. She's talked to doctors, the police, just about everyone in the hospital, and she's done with it all. She just wants to be home, in her own bed, with her sister right next door and her parents just downstairs.

The minutes tick by, and Carter's mind wanders. Idly she reaches for the psychiatrist's card, running her finger along the edge, wondering why the doctor had seemed so insistent that she might have tried to kill herself. She flips the card over, and her heart stops. There, in achingly familiar writing, are the words _I'll come back for you._

It's meant to be a promise, she knows that, but it comes across as a threat. Lori may have dropped her off at the hospital when her life was in danger, but she's not going to stop there. She's going to come back. And next time, Carter will be ready.

The door opens and she braces herself, half-expecting Lori to be standing in the doorway, but no. It's her family. Elizabeth in front, of course, with Taylor and David almost pushing her through the door and Grant trailing behind, shy but relieved. At the sight of them Carter feels a rush of relief, of gratitude – and, almost surprisingly, of love. _This is my family_ , she thinks with a faint kind of wonder. It hadn't felt like it at first, but they're all she has now.

But as Carter hitches a smile on her face and prepares to be welcomed back into the family, she tucks the psychiatrist's card under her pillow.

Just in case.

X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X

 **And there you go. Thoughts, comments, questions, concerns? Let me know in the reviews! I really hope you enjoyed this, and maybe I'll see you around the place.**


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